George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 6, 10th edition.

“ [263] in concert to utter the powerful word of liberty.

Chap. XL.} 1769. March

War between France and England would bind these countries more firmly to their metropolis. The example of happiness will allure them to the independence towards which they tend. By leading them to confide in France and Spain, they will dare more and dare sooner. Nothing can better persuade to this confidence than to establish liberty in Louisiana,” ¹ and to open the port of New Orleans to men of all nations and all religions.²

‘The passion for extended dominion must not hide from Spain, that a discontented and ill guarded Colony cannot arrest the march of the English, and will prove an unprofitable expense. Were we to take back Louisiana, our best efforts could effect less than the charm of liberty. Without the magic of liberty, the territory will never become more than a simple line of demarkation. Severity would throw it into despair and into the arms of the English. To give voluntarily what the British Parliament haughtily refuses, to assimilate New Orleans in its form to the freest of the British Colonies, to adopt for it from each of them whatever is the dearest to them, to do more, to enfranchise it and maintain invariably privileges capable of intoxicating the English and the Americans, this is to arm their America against themselves, by risking no more than what would otherwise be neglected.’ Every Frenchman had in his heart an excuse for the insurgents, and was ready to applaud their delirium of nationality and